Important Events From This day in History – 17 March

Today in History

• 1992 Apartheid in South Africa comes to an end

  In a referendum, 68.7% of white South Africans voted to end the country’s racial segregation.

• 1973 The photograph known as Burst of joy is taken

  Slava Veder won the Pulitzer Prize for his photograph of a former US prisoner of war being reunited with his family.

• 1969 Golda Meir becomes Israel’s first female Prime Minister

  In her country, Meir was known as the “Iron Lady” long before British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher rose to power.

• 1959 The Dalai Lama flees Tibet for India

  Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama’s followers and advisers, feared for his life after a revolt against the Chinese erupted in Lhasa.

• 1941 The National Gallery of Art opens in Washington. D.C.

  U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt opened the gallery, which today houses one of the world’s finest art collections.